Focus: The Pied Piper of Edinburgh

Could Edinburgh cope with the million protesters Bob Geldof has called for to demonstrate at the G8 summit, ask Mark Macaskill and Paul Lamarra

Paul Griffiths was relaxing in front of the television at his home in Hastings, East Sussex, last Tuesday evening when he switched channels to watch the news. Filling the screen was the tousled figure of Sir Bob Geldof, urging people to get to Edinburgh in any way they could to demand action from the G8 on world poverty.

Griffiths, a 36-year-old theatre manager, suddenly remembered the bright-yellow second-hand mountain bike he had sitting in a cupboard. His mind was made up on the spot. He was going to cycle the 490 miles to Edinburgh and join the protest. “It was what Geldof said about there being so much we all take for granted. He persuaded me.”

Spurred on by Geldof, Griffiths now believes that the G8 protests in Edinburgh could be one of the defining moments in world history. In his view, persuading the G8 leaders to cancel the debt